After some successful festival runs, Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning was released in the US on October 25th, 2012, both as Video-on-Demand and a month later even in some cinemas. Unfortunately, the film had to be censored for this since the distributor demanded an R-Rated version. This rating wasn't possible for the uncensored version of the movie because it was clearly too violent and got the infamous NC-17 classification instead.

While director John Hyams hinted at first that the VOD version could be uncensored, it turned out to be the opposite when the most (or even all) providers only offered the R-Rated cut of the movie. Still, hopes remained that the upcoming DVD and Blu-ray releases would contain the NC-17 version and Hyams thought so, too. However, as the announcements for the US home video releases show clearly, they will most likely only contain the R-Rated and not the NC-17 (or Unrated Director's Cut or whatever you want to call the uncut version).

In contrast, the situation in Germany is quite different and may be very interesting for international customers. The DVD and Blu-ray both contain the uncensored NC-17 version (and an English audio track). It should be noted though, that two cuts of the movie will be released in Germany due to the strict youth protection laws. If you are interested in buying the uncensored release, you have to pay attention to the cover artwork. The uncensored version, which comes as DVD, Blu-ray and Blu-ray 3D, has a big UNCUT sticker on the front and has been rated by an independent commission called SPIO/JK, which rates films that were rejected by the MPAA's German counterpart FSK.

Since films with the SPIO/JK rating can still be put on a black list (and possibly even banned in the further process), it is an economic necessity for German distributors to also produce an FSK-approved cut version in order to gain money in retail once the uncut version has been banned. On December 18th, 2012, the uncut version will start in German rental while the street date for retail is January 24th, 2013 (just two days after America gets its R-Rated releases). We encourage you to look closely if you try to buy it from sellers like Amazon.de, since the dominating version you'll find there will be the FSK-approved cut version (identifiable by the red "18" symbol in the lower left corner of the artwork.).